Two New Moodle Features
Contributed by Michael Gough, Instructional Technologist and Coordinator of START
During winter term, FITS added two new enhancements to Moodle that faculty members expressed great interest in at the Moodle User Group (MUG) discussion sessions.
Gradebook Plus add-on
The “out of the box” Moodle gradebook proved functional, but was limited in that you could only add an assignment generated outside of Moodle by adding an “offline activity”, which adds an icon to the course site. While these offline activity icons could serve as reminders to students, they also can clutter up the course space. Another limitation was the original gradebook did not allow for easy grade changes. Faculty members wanting to change a grade had to open the submitted assignment to change the grade. This was somewhat unintuitive and an inconvenient step for instructors who naturally would go to the gradebook to make grade changes.
The new gradebook,” Gradebook Plus,” solves both of these problems. First, it has a “Manage Graded Events” tab. This allows instructors to add an assignment to the gradebook without the need for an offline activity. This enhancement did not replace the offline activity option, as some users still use it as a reminder tool for students. Second, the new gradebook has an “Edit Grades” tab. When you click on this tab, the gradebook loads the grades into editable text boxes where you can change a grade quickly and easily without having to leave the gradebook to go to an individual assignment.
If “use advanced options” is turned on, you will see 2 new tabs, Edit Grades and Manage Grade Events.
Finally, the new gradebook came with enhanced statistics as a fringe benefit. You can now view statistics on individual assignments as well as the overall final grades by clicking on the stats button next to the assignment. Students can also view these statistics if they wish.
The Feedback Module
The Feedback Module, our newest enhancement to Moodle, offers you the ability to build customized surveys for your students. You can choose from an assortment of different online question types to build your survey. You can also choose to make your survey anonymous and show or withhold results with the students. This could be a great way to gather quick informal feedback, or even build your own course evaluation survey.
If you have any questions about these new features or Moodle in general, please email moodle@depauw.edu.